Plasmonic Photoanodes for Solar Water Splitting with Visible Light

We report a plasmonic water splitting cell in which 95% of the effective charge carriers derive from surface plasmon decay to hot electrons, as evidenced by fuel production efficiencies up to 20-fold higher at visible, as compared to UV, wavelengths. The cell functions by illuminating a dense array...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nano letters 2012-09, Vol.12 (9), p.5014-5019
Main Authors: Lee, Joun, Mubeen, Syed, Ji, Xiulei, Stucky, Galen D, Moskovits, Martin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Arrays
Catalytic methods
Collective excitations (including excitons, polarons, plasmons and other charge-density excitations)
Condensed matter: electronic structure, electrical, magnetic, and optical properties
Cross-disciplinary physics: materials science
rheology
Electrochemistry - instrumentation
Electrodes
Electronic structure and electrical properties of surfaces, interfaces, thin films and low-dimensional structures
Equipment Design
Equipment Failure Analysis
Exact sciences and technology
Gold
Hot electrons
Hydrogen - chemistry
Hydrogen - isolation & purification
Light
Materials science
Methods of nanofabrication
Nanocrystalline materials
Nanorods
Nanoscale materials and structures: fabrication and characterization
Nanostructure
Nanostructures - chemistry
Nanostructures - radiation effects
Nanostructures - ultrastructure
Nanotubes
Oxygen - chemistry
Oxygen - isolation & purification
Physics
Plasmonics
Semiconductors
Solar Energy
Surface and interface electron states
Surface Plasmon Resonance - instrumentation
Titanium - chemistry
Titanium - radiation effects
Titanium dioxide
Water - chemistry
Water splitting
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Description
Summary:We report a plasmonic water splitting cell in which 95% of the effective charge carriers derive from surface plasmon decay to hot electrons, as evidenced by fuel production efficiencies up to 20-fold higher at visible, as compared to UV, wavelengths. The cell functions by illuminating a dense array of aligned gold nanorods capped with TiO2, forming a Schottky metal/semiconductor interface which collects and conducts the hot electrons to an unilluminated platinum counter-electrode where hydrogen gas evolves. The resultant positive charges in the Au nanorods function as holes and are extracted by an oxidation catalyst which electrocatalytically oxidizes water to oxygen gas.
ISSN:1530-6984
1530-6992
DOI:10.1021/nl302796f